JPop disappearing from iTunes US!

[StarSUCKER]

What the hell?! I had stuff in my cart from alan, Ami Suzuki, Anna Tsuchiya, BoA, DAI, KOTOKO, OLIVIA, Radwimps, Tomiko Van...it's all unavailable. Searching for Ayu brings up nothing now, when before it brought up tons of albums (mostly remix albums), plus GUILTY (which was SUPPOSED to be an international digital release anyway).

I was just thinking there may be hope for iTunes US when I saw that they added the Rule/Sparkle single...*sigh* so much for that...

Does anybody know what they're doing?!

[hikaricore]

They're changing ALL of the songs on iTunes to iTunes plus.
The songs will HOPEFULLY be back up soon.
Sorry about your songs!

[I Am... Aaron]

The problem is not with Apple or iTunes but Avex. Back in January Apple gave in to the major music labels request to allow "variable pricing" (0.69, 0.99, 1.29) in exchange for them giving Apple DRM free high quality files. The downside however, is that not ALL labels, mainly the smaller ones or non-local ones like Avex, were part of this deal. Apple wants ALL songs in the store to be DRM free now and 256kbps AAC, but if the labels don't agree, then we as consumers are out of luck.

I just hope that they can make a deal soon and get Ayumi's stuff back on, in the new iTunes Plus format. What I would suggest you and everyone you know who can help, to do, is use the iTunes request page at http://www.apple.com/feedback/itunes.html

We're gonna need to start pushing again so they realize there is enough interest!

[MarsReiko]

Yeah me too!. Good thing I got mine when i did =/

[hikaricore]

This is totally not cool...

[I Am... Aaron]

Hey you two above me, did you read what I wrote?

Go to the link and make new requests! That way Apple will pester Avex into releasing the tracks without DRM!

[AyuRox]

wow... ok, so I apologize in advance for my ranting, and for being EXTREMELY irate.

(and btw, iTunes US got rid of ALL their SEB albums, too.)

I'm SO p.o.ed that iTunes did this! I wanna go shoot the person that makes these kinds of decisions. (*breaks into song* "sou boku wa yuku") *ahem...* sorry 'bout that... OK... not really... I'm not a murderer... but maybe I could beat him within an inch of his life? Let's start a riot! *punches fist into air* AYU FANS UNITE!!! *cricket cricket* ...ok, maybe not...

But yeah, I'm really angry about this. I sent an EXTREMELY angry email to iTunes support, but it was like, NO help at all! They were like "oh, yeah, you can put in requests here, and send comments here". In his defense, though, he didn't really have access to info pertaining to the song removal. And I'm just thinking "I've sent, like, 30 requests per album to iTunes for all Ayu's albums they don't have, and I've got nothing. You think that something's gonna happen NOW???"

Am I the only one who thinks that Avex is trying to keep their music out of the US?

But really, all of us need to send angry emails and countless requests to iTunes. Maybe they'll finally act on our requests for once...

I mean, do they even realize that iTunes was the only way for J-pop fans to et their music at a reasonable price???!!! They honestly don't care about anyone who doesn't listen to that horrible American pop trash, do they?

Maybe its Avex's fault and I'm too quick to point the finger, but then Avex is losing a lot of money by not letting their music on iTunes.

If what the other person said about the variable pricing is true, I can imagine that if the J=pop comes back, that they'll all be ridiculously overpriced. I mean, as it was before, none of the singles were actually priced as singles. And every chance they got, they'd price the full albums for $11.99 instead of $9.99. AAARRRGGHH!!!! I hate iTunes SO much sometimes! If not for the fact that is was the only way for me to get music at a reasonable price with no shipping, I woul've stopped using iTunes alltogether. Actually, I probably wouldn't have started using iTunes at all if I could buy Ayu's albums at an actual store.

iTunes NEEDS to get their J-pop back. Or I'm gonna do more than send angry emails and rant on forums.

All j-pop fans need to jump all over iTunes's &*% and MAKE THEM get the J-pop back. I've had enough of having to wait on things in the mail! I've had enough of getting Taiwanese CDs from eBay when they should've been Japanese! (btw, did you know that you can sue for that?) I've had ENOUGH of my requests not being acted upon by iTunes!!

BRING J-POP BACK TO THE US!!!!!!!